Katrina's other disaster : examining second disaster literature and placing post-Katrina New Orleans

Abstract

[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT AUTHOR'S REQUEST.] This thesis examines the literary treatment of the time period following major natural and manmade disasters known as the "second disaster," which this project refers to as "Second Disaster Literature." While most literature depicting disasters tends to focus on the initial disaster "the hurricane, the tornado, the explosion" Second Disaster Literature centers its narrative around the complex and often equally detrimental series of events that proceed the initial disaster in efforts to further expose and better understand the issues most significant to that disaster as a whole. This project looks at Second Disaster Literature specifically in regard to Hurricane Katrina, which it refers to as "Katrina Second Disaster Literature" or "Katrina Literature" for short. This thesis looks at examples of Katrina Literature such as Dave Eggers Zeitoun, Josh Neufeld's New Orleans After the Deluge, and Tom Piazza's City of Refuge incorporate the initial hurricane and flood, but concentrate on the gross mismanagement of New Orleans' recovery effort following Hurricane Katrina, including the mistreatment of New Orleanians by local and federal agencies, relief workers, and volunteers who came primarily from outside New Orleans to help. These texts of Katrina Literature demonstrate that these events were ultimately more detrimental to New Orleans than the hurricane and flood were, and therefore, the most significant disaster in terms of understanding the true impact of Hurricane Katrina.